Fire and Vengeance

by Robert McCaw

  On one such adventure, Koa had hooked an a‘u, a broadbill swordfish, one of Hawai‘i’s most prized sport fish. It wasn’t a grander, a fish weighing over a 1000 pounds, but it was a tremendous haul for a fifteen-year-old, and he’d spent the better part of an hour working the line before he finally landed the big fish. Koa bragged about his triumph for weeks, and the fishing pole became his most treasured possession. He named the pole makau—fish hook.

  Despite, or maybe because of, Koa’s pride in his fishing pole, Ikaika repeatedly threw things at it and warned he would break it in half. Koa never dreamed his brother would actually make good on his threat, yet Ikaika did just that. One day, Koa walked into their house to find Ikaika holding the precious pole. With a malevolent gleam in his eyes, he snapped it in two, hurling the pieces to the floor. Koa confronted his brother and a fight ensued during which Ikaika laughed hysterically. Koa would never forget his brother’s glee at his cruel act or the sound of his chortling. For the first time in Koa’s life, he’d come face-to-face with pure malice. A harbinger of things to come.

  His mother, Māpuana, said Ikaika would grow out of it, but she’d been wrong. As he grew older and stronger, Ikaika, which meant strong in his native Hawaiian, became a fierce bully, terrorizing other kids in school. Ikaika had his first of many run-ins with the juvenile justice system when, at age twelve, he stole a bicycle from a local shop. By the time he reached eighteen, he’d become an experienced criminal. Joyriding turned into auto theft, and glue-sniffing morphed into marijuana and cocaine. Not unlike many Hawaiian men, by age thirty-four, Ikaika had been in and out of jail more times than he could count, having spent nearly a fourth of his adult life behind bars.

  The toll on the family was horrendous. Each member reacted differently as the stress from Ikaika’s misconduct ricocheted throughout the family and ultimately reflected back on Ikaika himself. Māpuana forgave Ikaika his every failing and pressed her other three children to do likewise. But neither his middle brother, Mauloa, nor his sister, Alana, shared their mother’s compassion. Alana, who lived with Māpuana, reacted angrily, often screaming at Ikaika whenever he caused his mother pain. Mauloa simply withdrew and hadn’t spoken to Ikaika in years. The varied reactions within Koa’s family turned in a vicious circle, only amplifying Māpuana’s pain.

  Koa tried, visiting his brother in prison, lending him money, and helping him find jobs. Ikaika never repaid or thanked Koa and blamed Koa for every reversal. Their relationship soured.

  What had Alana said? “He wants to see you.” Koa couldn’t remember the last time his youngest brother wanted to see him. Had brain surgery really made Ikaika less hostile? Was it just a temporary reaction to survival? Or had surgery caused a real change in personality? Koa would know soon enough.

  He went straight from the airport to the hospital—to the special ward for prisoners and those locked up for psychiatric reasons. The old, ugly, gray wing of the hospital seemed more like a jail than a medical facility. Koa found his brother sitting up in bed, his head bandaged with wires connecting him to all variety of monitors. Ikaika appeared calm, even relaxed. When had he ever seen his kid brother relaxed?

  “Hey, big brah.” The warmth in Ikaika’s simple greeting gave the words special meaning. The hostility so often filling his eyes had disappeared, replaced by calm, or passivity.

  “Hello, little brother, how are you feeling?”

  A shadow of a grin flashed across Ikaika’s face. “Like they cut a fuckin’ hole in my head.”

  The tiny grin struck Koa like a thunderbolt—he hadn’t seen his brother smile in years. He tried to think of the last time he’d seen Ikaika smile. Maybe when Māpuana had given Ikaika a toy tractor for his eighth birthday? “You need medicine?”

  “Nah.” Ikaika nodded toward a machine. “That crazy thing feeds me dope every few minutes. It’s a damn fine candy man.” Another tiny smile.

  Koa felt a surge of affection toward his brother unlike any he’d experienced in a long time. “Tell me what happened. Why’d you black out?”

  “I had a seizure in the jailhouse. I remember a weird dizzy feeling—the room spinning ’round like a top—then bang. Somebody pulled the plug, and the power went dark. I guess the paramedics tried to revive me. I don’t know. I woke up here, and they told me they’d removed a brain tumor.”

  “What have they told you about the tumor?”

  “The doc cut the suckers out, got two tumors. That’s supposed to be good. I might actually live a while longer.”

  Ikaika’s recognition of vulnerability surprised Koa. “That’s great.”

  “The tumors were right here.” Ikaika pointed to his forehead.

  “Have the medics told you what to expect?”

  “A little. They told me I might have different feelings, like a personality shift or some shit like that.” Ikaika paused. “Maybe not a bad thing, huh?”

  Ikaika’s mild self-deprecation stunned Koa. The old Ikaika would never in a lifetime have said anything like that. “Like what?”

  “Dunno. Right now I’m mostly screwed up in the head.”

  “Confused?”

  “Yeah. It’s like I don’t know how I got in prison. I mean, I know what I did, but I don’t understand why. It’s all jumbled up in my head.”

  Koa’s spirits soared. The calmness, the half-smile, the self-deprecation—all good signs. He started to discuss the future and the possibility of parole with Ikaika, but a nurse came in to take Ikaika’s vitals. She looked at Koa for a moment before saying, “You must be the hero brother.”

  Her words took Koa aback. “The hero brother? Where’d you get that idea?”

  “From him.” She pointed to Ikaika. “Told me you saved his life.”

  Standing out in the hall while the nurse worked, Koa wondered what had happened to the old Ikaika. He wasn’t sorry to lose the mean brute he’d known for thirty-five years, but the transformation left him feeling strange, like the ground had shifted under his feet. His brother blamed him for destroying his life by sending him back to prison, and now, Ikaika was telling the nurse Koa had saved his life. The change was disorienting.

  When the nurse left, Koa took a seat beside his brother’s hospital bed. Alexia Sheppard had warned against exaggerating the chances of parole. Koa didn’t want to create false expectations, but he needed to secure Ikaika’s cooperation. He explained the possibility, emphasizing the risks. He wasn’t yet ready to reveal his agreement with Walker McKenzie, so he said he had a line on some medical experts.

  His brother listened intently without interrupting. Yet another new behavior. When Koa finished, Ikaika had a thoughtful, but serious expression. “You know, big brother, I’ve made a lot of enemies over the years, like that prick Moyan.” Ikaika referred to his parole officer. “You really think the parole board is going to give me another chance?”

  “It’s a long shot,” Koa conceded, “but what have you got to lose? I mean, all they can do is say ‘no’ in which case you’re no worse off.”

  “Okay, whatever you say, big brother.”

  Koa couldn’t quite believe Ikaika’s new attitude, but he knew how to test it. The old Ikaika, imagining some evil conspiracy, objected to any communication between Alexia Sheppard, his lawyer, and Koa. Koa took a deep breath before saying, “I’ve talked this over with Alexia Sheppard—”

  He provoked no outburst—no reaction at all—and continued toward the next potentially explosive hurdle—Ikaika’s paranoia about access to his criminal history. “She says the medical experts will need both your criminal history and your medical records.”

  Koa saw a flicker of something—maybe anger—in Ikaika’s eyes. “They want to pick me apart like some lab rat?”

  Koa paused, absorbing this subtle throwback to the old Ikaika. “They need to understand whether the tumors affected your behavior.”

  The tantrum Koa’s words would have provoked before the surgery never materialized. Instead, Ikaika sat silently, staring at him. Koa couldn�
�t read his brother’s passivity, so he asked, “Are you following me?”

  “Yeah, big bro, I’m following you.”

  “I’ve brought the consents if you’re ready to sign.”

  “And you think I ought to do this?”

  Extraordinary. Ikaika asking him for advice. That had never happened before. “Yeah, Ikaika, I think you should do this. As I said, you’ve nothing to lose by trying.”

  Ikaika stared off into space, and Koa wondered what he was thinking. Then it struck him. His brother was thinking, actually thinking and not just reacting like the old Ikaika. Finally, his brother spoke. “I guess felons don’t have much privacy worth protecting, do they?”

  What could Koa say? “No, not much.”

  “Okay, let’s do it,” Ikaika finally concluded.

  Koa called for a nurse, who witnessed Ikaika’s signature. They wrapped up, and when Koa was on the way out the door to meet with the experts Walker McKenzie had lined up, Ikaika stopped him. “Koa.”

  “Yeah, Ikaika?”

  “Mahalo.”

  That word nearly brought tears to Koa’s eyes. In thirty-four years, his brother had never thanked him for anything.

  Koa met Dr. Carlton in his office, and Ikaika’s neurosurgeon led Koa into a conference room where he introduced Drs. Reinhardt and Kepler. “I don’t know who’s pulling the strings for you, Detective,” Dr. Carlton said, “but you’ve lined up two of the country’s leading brain experts.” Koa shook hands and thanked the doctors for taking the time to meet with him.

  The three doctors could not have been more unalike. Dr. Carlton, a small wiry man with close-cropped blond hair and piercing blue eyes, had hands like a concert pianist with long, strong fingers. A surgeon’s hands. Images of those deft fingers inside Ikaika’s skull, illuminated by the bright lights above an operating table, flashed through Koa’s mind.

  Koa couldn’t imagine Dr. Kepler, a redheaded Irishman with a neatly trimmed beard, in an operating room. With sparkling green eyes and an impish smile, he seemed better suited to an Irish pub than the lecture hall of the California medical school where he usually held forth. Still, he exuded warmth, and Koa took an instant liking to the man.

  Dr. Reinhardt, a tall Brooklyn New Yorker with a narrow face, wearing a yarmulke, was the most reserved. And he, unlike the others, wore a dark suit and tie. Koa sensed he felt out of place and wondered if he had come only as a favor to Walker McKenzie.

  Dr. Carlton took the lead. “I’ve shared Ikaika’s scans and the surgical findings with my colleagues, so they know we found two separate pilocytic astrocytomas in the orbitofrontal cortex. The biopsy results showed variably textured glioma matrix with Rosenthal fibers and eosinophilic granular bodies and indicators of increased proliferative activity.” The doctor stopped and looked at Koa. “In plain English, these tumors grow quite slowly—so slowly they likely developed in childhood. They are rare in adults—about one per four million people—and were just beginning to show signs of developing malignancy.”

  “What interests me,” Dr. Kepler intervened, standing up and moving to a computer monitor attached to the wall, “is the location of the two tumors—” he placed a finger on the X-ray, inside the forehead just above Ikaika’s eyes—“located right here behind the eye sockets. Numerous studies show this part of the brain plays a role in decision-making, especially in balancing reward and punishment.”

  As Dr. Kepler spoke, Koa watched the doctor’s animated face and the laugh lines around his eyes. He appeared to be in his fifties and utterly absorbed in his specialty.

  “Studies suggest trauma to the orbitofrontal cortex can impair a patient’s ability to anticipate the consequences of antisocial behavior.”

  “Does that mean,” Koa asked, “that these tumors caused my brother’s sociopathic behavior?”

  “That’s not a meaningful question,” Dr. Reinhardt intervened in a deep voice with a stereotypical Brooklyn accent. “Let me explain. If you had an impulse to hit me with your fist, a normal brain would evaluate the likely positive rewards and negative punishments. No medical expert could responsibly assert that a tumor caused your impulse to use your fist, but a tumor could impair your ability to assess the consequences of acting on that impulse.”

  “What’s interesting about your brother’s case,” Dr. Kepler reasserted himself, “is these tumors have existed for a long time—probably since childhood. Children become socialized and adults learn to balance and rebalance rewards and punishments as they accumulate experience. If the balancing function is impaired throughout a lifetime, it could plausibly lead to sociopathic behavior—what one researcher labeled ‘acquired sociopathy.’”

  “Is that what happened to my brother?”

  “It’s theoretically possible,” Dr. Reinhardt responded, “but we have almost no clinical experience with long-term cases. All of the recent advances in our understanding come from battlefield injuries.”

  That didn’t sound promising. “You wouldn’t be able to say the tumors contributed to my brother’s behavioral problems?” Koa asked.

  “I’m telling you the odds aren’t good,” Dr. Reinhardt responded clinically. “We can study his medical and criminal history, and maybe, just maybe, find markers to support the conclusion you want, but it will more likely be inconclusive.”

  “Are you willing to give it a try?” Koa asked.

  “I understand that your brother was involved with a child sex ring. Is that correct?” Dr. Reinhardt asked.

  It wasn’t a friendly question. Koa wasn’t sure where the medic was going, but he didn’t like the direction. “Yes, that’s correct, but he wasn’t prosecuted.”

  Dr. Reinhardt shook his head and began to collect his papers. “I’m sorry, but I really don’t have time for this project.” He pushed his chair back from the table, rose to his feet, and left the conference room.

  Koa looked quizzically at Dr. Kepler.

  “You’ll have to forgive him. His daughter was raped. He’s understandably sensitive about sex crimes.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

  THE CONFERENCE ROOM remained deathly quiet for what seemed like an eternity after Dr. Reinhardt left. Koa felt bitterly disappointed. He turned to Dr. Kepler. “What about you? Are you willing to see what you can do to help my brother?”

  “Most definitely,” Dr. Kepler responded. “For me, this is a unique opportunity to study a brain with long-standing damage, but I don’t want to get your hopes up. Dr. Reinhardt is correct that the results will most likely be inconclusive.”

  Koa cringed. This neurologist viewed his brother as a bizarre case study, like a one-legged rat in a laboratory cage. He knew what his brother would think. Ikaika would be angry and offended. He’d tell this doctor to go to hell.

  Yet, there existed a small chance the doctor could help. Koa wondered if he should have another discussion with his brother but decided against it. He handed Dr. Kepler a thick file. “This has my brother’s whole criminal history, including psychiatric reports from various prison doctors. The file also contains a consent for access to his criminal and medical records.”

  Dr. Kepler took the file. “I’ll also need more tests—including some interactive brain scans—as well as interviews with your brother.”

  “The prison authorities won’t release Ikaika for the additional brain scans,” Dr. Carlton inserted himself, “but I can arrange for them to be done here while your brother recuperates.”

  “Thank you,” Koa responded. “You know I can’t pay you for your work.”

  “Don’t worry,” Dr. Kepler responded. “A pilocytic astrocytoma occurs in one in four million adults—very few of those are in the orbitofrontal cortex—and I’ve found no medical record of an adult patient with two such tumors. Your brother presents a unique medical anomaly, and it will be a privilege to study him.”

  There it was again, laid right out on the table for everyone to see. Ikaika the guinea pig—the lab rat—for this brain-shrink to examine. Koa hid his anno
yance and chose to focus on the slim possibility of success.

  “Before we break,” Dr. Kepler said, “I have a question. As a child, did your brother ever have seizures?”

  The question triggered a vague recollection. “I think so,” Koa said, “but my mother would know for sure. She’s in Ikaika’s room. Let me bring her in here.”

  Koa found Māpuana, led her into the conference room, and introduced her to Dr. Kepler. Koa didn’t want to get her hopes up, and he most certainly didn’t want Dr. Kepler to repeat his guinea pig speech, so Koa said only that Dr. Kepler wanted to help Ikaika.

  “Mrs. Kāne,” the doctor began, “did your youngest son have seizures as a child?”

  Koa saw the suspicion in his mother’s eyes. Old-school Hawaiian, instinctively wary of haoles, especially doctors, she said, “What for? Why do you want to know?”

  Dr. Kepler, too, noticed Māpuana’s wariness. “We are trying to help your son, trying to determine how long your son had his tumors. Brain tumors frequently cause seizures, and if Ikaika had seizures as a child, the tumors could have affected him from a young age.”

  “Oh,” Māpuana responded, “and why is that important?”

  She guarded her son, protecting any information about him against misuse. Koa saw no choice but to tell her about the parole possibility, but he warned the odds against success were long.

  Māpuana looked at Dr. Kepler in a whole new light and became a font of information. “Yes, Ikaika had problems around age four. He would just stare off into space and sometimes his body would go limp. He dropped things.”

  “Absence seizures?” Dr. Kepler asked.

  “Yes, that is what the haole doctor called them.”

  “And he prescribed medicine?”

  “Yes … dep … a … something,” Māpuana struggled to remember. “I’m not sure.”

  “Depakote?”

  “Yes … that was it.”

  Dr. Kepler nodded. “This is going to be most interesting.”

  Koa did not return directly to the Big Island but instead went to the KITV studios on King Street in Honolulu’s Chinatown to fulfill his commitment to Walker McKenzie, who had arranged to use its studio facilities. McKenzie, in his ever-present white shirt with rolled-up sleeves, interviewed Koa for three hours, filming as the discussion progressed. They began with Koa’s childhood, living with two brothers and a sister in a shack with no indoor plumbing alongside the dying cane fields on the Hāmākua coast. They talked about his father’s death in a sugar mill accident, and how his mother, a native healer in the tiny village of Laupāhoehoe, had insisted he get a good education. He didn’t mention his confrontation with Anthony Hazzard—that he’d killed the man—or that he’d covered up the crime. He told McKenzie about his years at the Kamehameha schools for children of Hawaiian heritage. “I’d be poor, unemployed, and in jail, if it hadn’t been for Māmā,” Koa admitted.